Sunday, October 30, 2016

First time in Spain - exploring Valencia

I was fortunate enough to travel to a conference being held in Valencia this week. It sounds glamorous but I spent most of the days I was there either in the conference rooms (no windows) or in my hotel checking work emails (at least I had windows).

Nice hotel though, right next to the conference centre

When I was working in my room the view wasn't bad

We mainly got to see Valencia by night, so I don't have any good photos of the architecture. This is the city hall.

And this is the North train station. Not bad for a train station.

After floods in the 70s they diverted the river around the city and turned the river bed into a huge sunken park. Whoever thought of that was a visionary. The old bridges still cross the park.

In the park you can walk under the bridges.

There's lots to see in the park and at the South end are some amazing buildings.

They don't miss an opportunity for some art - this big purple sculpture was on a roundabout.

The front of this building was covered in traffic cones.

This is one of the metro stations., I thought it was rather lovely.

There's lots of graffiti on the streets as well. Someone likes drawing these cute ninja dudes. They pop up everywhere.

Valencia is famous for its paella. They sell paella pans on the street alongside other souvenirs.

Paella goes nicely with cerveza. This is Valencia IPA (VIPA). It has a peachy aroma and tastes lovely.

It was a brief visit, made all the more brief by having to work at the conference. But I really like Valencia and I definitely want to go back.